As of February 19, 2014, the Groton-Dunstable Regional School Committee has recommended to eliminate Foreign Languages and Art & Music from the middle school, eliminate Music & Art from the high school and eliminate six teachers in the elementary schools in grades 3 & 4 that will result in class size increases ranging from 26 to 30 students.

The residents of Groton & Dunstable are choosing to speak out to their recommendation. We feel that they are taking the easy way out and instead of properly investigating all revenue programs suggested at the numerous public meetings they are choosing to dismantle the curriculum. Here is the petition that was set up about an hour ago. It is also being promoted on FB and shared with any news reporter that will give me five minutes of their time. We welcome all signatures to help our quest to educate the whole-child and offer a well-rounded education to the children that reside in Groton & Dunstable MA.

I saw your report on Facebook and felt a need to write. I went through the Groton school system from 4th grade to 12th grade. Because of the music program I participated in with Edie Tompkins, singing in her choir in 7th grade, I developed a love of singing. I have sung at weddings, a funeral, taught music to children, and sung in choirs. I have also led worship, participated on worship teams, and led kids singing at Vacation Bible School at my church for several years. Music is an essential part of any school curriculum. To take it out would be an enormous shame, to say the least. This also applies to the art curriculum. Kids need to learn more and expand on their love of both areas (music and art). I no longer live in Groton, otherwise, I would sign the petition. I wish you all the best.

To my knowledge, the school committee has not recommended to make any cuts. What was released on February 19 was the list of additional cuts compiled by the school administration that would be needed if Groton and Dunstable do not cover the entire $2.6 million shortfall in the budget.

I completely agree that many of the cuts outlined–including those to arts and music–would severely damage the quality of education in our schools if they came to pass. But I think it’s a disservice to the process when you misrepresent the list of possible cuts as being recommended or endorsed by the school committee.

If you want to avoid these cuts, and preserve (and hopefully grow) the programs being offered in our schools, the best course is to support a tax override that will cover the current shortfall and provide a sustainable source of revenue for our schools going forward.

There is a school committee meeting this Wednesday night, 2/26, in the High School library if you want to hear directly about where the budget stands. I believe the final budget needs to be certified by middle of next week.

To confirm Mr. Kubick’s comment, the committee has not endorsed nor recommended any cuts at the current time. Rather, we are going through the normal and necessary process of assessing the scope of impact and potential savings of program changes, so that we can balance the budget regardless of where we end up on the revenues side. This also means that we have not abandoned the many revenue ideas that have been brought forth.

As indicated, there is a posted School Committee meeting at the High School tomorrow, Wednesday, February 26th. A significant portion of that meeting will be spent focusing on discussing potential changes – both revenue and cost side – that have been offered/presented to date.